Random Facts
| In fiscal year 2005, 33.1% of all federal powder cocaine defendants were low-level offenders such as mules or street-dealers. Only 12.8% were high-level dealers. Source:
US Sentencing Commission, "Report to Congress: Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy," (Washington, DC: May 2007), p. 19, Figure 2-4.
http://www.ussc.gov/r_Congress/Cocaine2007.pdf
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| In fiscal year 2005, 40.4% of all federal powder cocaine defendants were low-level offenders such as mules or street-dealers. Only 12.8% were high-level dealers. Source:
US Sentencing Commission, "Report to Congress: Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy," (Washington, DC: May 2007), p. 19, Figure 2-4.
http://www.ussc.gov/r_Congress/Cocaine2007.pdf
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| About a quarter of the women on probation nationwide had been drinking at the time of their offense compared to more than 40% of male probationers. For those convicted of public-order crimes, nearly two-thirds of women and three-quarters of men had been drinking at the time of the offense. Source:
Greenfield, Lawrence A., US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Alcohol and Crime: An Analysis of National Data on the Prevalence of Alcohol Involvement in Crime (Washington, DC: US Department of Justice, April, 1998), p. 24. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| "Among jail inmates in 2002 who had ever been tested for HIV, Hispanics (2.9%) were more than 3 times as likely as whites (0.8%) and twice as likely as blacks (1.2%) to report being HIV positive." Source:
Maruschak, Laura M. "HIV In Prisons and Jails, 2002," NCJ-205333 (Washington, DC: Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Dec. 2004), p. 1.
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/hivpj02.pdf | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| "Annual marijuana prevalence peaked among 12th graders in 1979 at 51%, following a rise that began during the 1960s. Then use declined fairly steadily for 13 years, bottoming at 22% in 1992—a decline of more than half. The 1990s, however, saw a resurgence of use. After a considerable increase (one that actually began among 8th graders a year earlier than among 10th and 12th graders), annual prevalence rates peaked in 1996 at 8th grade and in 1997 at 10th and 12th grades. After 1996 there was a continuing gradual decline among 8th graders through 2007, with a pause in 2005. Considering the small increase in 2008, use now is down from the 1996 peak level by about two fifths. In the upper grades, only a very modest decline occurred between 1997 and 2002, followed by a continuing gradual decline. In 10th grade, the decline continued through 2008; while for 12th graders, it halted in 2007 and then use rose slightly in 2008." Source:
Johnston, L. D., O’Malley, P. M., Bachman, J. G., & Schulenberg, J. E. (2009). Monitoring the Future national results on adolescent drug use: Overview of key findings, 2008 (NIH Publication No. 09-7401). Bethesda, MD: National Institute on Drug Abuse, p. 12.
http://monitoringthefuture.org/pubs/monographs/overview2008.pdf | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Although people may think that the Drug War targets drug smugglers and 'King Pins,' in 2007, 47.4 percent of the 1,841,182 total arrests for drug abuse violations were for marijuana -- a total of 872,720. Of those, 775,137 people were arrested for marijuana possession alone. By contrast in 2000 a total of 734,497 Americans were arrested for marijuana offenses, of which 646,042 were for possession alone.
Source:
Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2008 (Washington, DC: US Dept. of Justice, 2008), Table 29, from the web at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2008/data/table_29.html and Arrest Table: Arrests for Drug Abuse Violations, from the web http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2008/arrests/index.html last accessed Sept. 19, 2009; Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2007 (Washington, DC: US Dept. of Justice, 2008), Table 29, from the web at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/data/table_29.html and Arrest Table: Arrests for Drug Abuse Violations, from the web http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/arrests/index.html last accessed Sept. 18, 2008; Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2006 (Washington, DC: US Dept. of Justice, 2007), Table 29, from the web at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2006/data/table_29.html and Arrest Table: Arrests for Drug Abuse Violations, from the web http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2006/arrests/index.html last accessed Sept. 24, 2007; Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2005 (Washington, DC: US Dept. of Justice, 2006), Table 29, from the web at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/05cius/data/table_29.html and Arrest Table: Arrests for Drug Abuse Violations, from the web http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/05cius/arrests/index.html last accessed Sept. 20, 2006; Crime in the United States: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2004 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 2005), p. 278, Table 4.1 & p. 280, Table 29; Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2003 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 2004), p. 269, Table 4.1 & and p. 270, Table 29; Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2002 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 2003), p. 234, Table 4.1 & and p. 234, Table 29; Federal Bureau of Investigation, Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2001 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 2002), p. 232, Table 4.1 & and p. 233, Table 29; Uniform Crime Reports for the United States 2000 (Washington DC: US Government Printing Office, 2001), pp. 215-216, Tables 29 and 4.1; Uniform Crime Reports for the United States 1999 (Washington DC: US Government Printing Office, 2000), pp. 211-212; Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reports for the United States 1998 (Washington DC: US Government Printing Office, 1999), pp. 209-210; Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 1997 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1998), p. 221, Table 4.1 & p. 222, Table 29; Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 1996 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1997), p. 213, Table 4.1 & p. 214, Table 29; FBI, UCR for the US 1995 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1996), pp. 207-208; FBI, UCR for the US 1990 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1991), pp. 173-174; FBI, UCR for the US 1980 (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1981), pp. 189-191; Bureau of Justice Statistics, Chart of arrests by age group, number and rates for total offenses, violent offenses, and property offenses, 1970-2003, Dec. 2004. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| "In establishing the mandatory minimum penalties for cocaine, Congress differentiated between the two principal forms of cocaine – cocaine hydrochloride [hereinafter referred to as powder cocaine] and cocaine base [hereinafter referred to as crack cocaine] – and provided significantly higher punishment for crack cocaine offenses.9 As a result of the 1986 Act, federal law10 requires a five-year mandatory minimum penalty for a first-time trafficking offense involving five grams or more of crack cocaine, or 500 grams or more of powder cocaine, and a ten-year mandatory minimum penalty for a first-time trafficking offense involving 50 grams or more of crack cocaine, or 5,000 grams or more of powder cocaine. Because it takes 100 times more powder cocaine than crack cocaine to trigger the same mandatory minimum penalty, this penalty structure is commonly referred to as the '100-to-1 drug quantity ratio.'" Source:
US Sentencing Commission, "Report to Congress: Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy," (Washington, DC: May 2007), pp. 1-2.
http://www.ussc.gov/r_Congress/Cocaine2007.pdf
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| "Although marijuana grown in the United States was once considered inferior because of a low concentration of THC, advancements in plant selection and cultivation have resulted in higher THC-containing domestic marijuana. In 1974, the average THC content of illicit marijuana was less than one percent. Today most commercial grade marijuana from Mexico/Columbia and domestic outdoor cultivated marijuana has an average THC content of about 4 to 6 percent. Between 1998 and 2002, NIDA-sponsored Marijuana Potency Monitoring System (MPMP) analyzed 4,603 domestic samples. Of those samples, 379 tested over 15 percent THC, 69 samples tested between 20 and 25 percent THC and four samples tested over 25 percent THC." Source:
US Drug Enforcement Administration, "Drugs of Abuse" (Washington, DC: US Dept. of Justice, 2005), from the web at http://www.dea.gov/pubs/abuse/7-pot.htm last accessed Oct. 23, 2009. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| "The system of penalties for juveniles facing criminal charges in Russia is based on suspended sentences or detention in educational correctional facilities, which house young offenders aged up to 21 years. The average sentence is four years. Only one quarter of adult recidivists considered a high-risk to society are said to have been admitted to a VK as juveniles." Source:
UNODC, "Illicit Drug Trends in the Russian Federation, 2005" (UNODC Regional Office for Russia and Belarus, Nov. 2006), p. 15. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Of the 1,841,182 arrests for drug law violations in 2007, 82.5% (1,518,975) were for possession of a controlled substance. Only 17.5% (322,207) were for the sale or manufacture of a drug. Source:
Crime in America: FBI Uniform Crime Reports 2007 (Washington, DC: US Dept. of Justice, 2008), Table 29, from the web at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/data/table_29.html and Arrest Table: Arrests for Drug Abuse Violations, from the web at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/arrests/index.html last accessed Sept. 18, 2008. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||